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Etymology and origin of the English word commune

commune1 to converse intimately

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
c. 1303 Manning's Handlyng Synne
Borrowed from
Old French comuner via Middle English
Ultimate origin
Latin commūnis
Etymology tree of commune1
inherited borrowed derived
Latin communio
English communion
English commune

Pronunciation

  • /kəˈmjuːn/[1]

Etymology

The verb is inherited from Middle English communen, also comunen and comonen,[2][3][4] borrowed from Old French comuner (“to make common, share”),[4][3][5][6][7] in Anglo-Norman also comunier,[8] from comun (“common”), from Latin commūnis (“common, shared by all”), the source of common.[4][9] The American Heritage Dictionary adds that it perhaps also comes from communier (“to share in the Communion”), from Late Latin commūnicō, the source of communicate,[10] and Merriam-Webster's Collegiate traces the senses "to share" and "to receive Communion" to Anglo-Norman communer and cummunier, from Late Latin.[11] The OED treats it as a variant of the verb common, whose forms ending in -une later came to be used for the senses of conversing.[5] Collins and Dictionary.com take the sense "to receive Communion" as a back-formation from English communion.[12][13]

Earliest recorded meaning

To have dealings with someone: about 1303, as comonen in Robert Manning's Handlyng Synne, according to Barnhart.[3] The Middle English Dictionary records the sense "to share, to participate" from 1340,[2] and the OED, which keeps the earliest forms under the verb common, dates the sense "to talk together" to before 1393, in Gower's Confessio Amantis.[5]

Semantic evolution

In Middle English the verb meant to share something, to take part, and to associate or have dealings with others, all senses found already in Anglo-Norman.[2][8][4] The meaning "to talk together, confer" is recorded from the late 14th century,[4][5][3] and Chaucer used the verb for "converse, associate".[14] Before 1400 the verb could mean to give someone the Eucharist, a sense obsolete by 1500.[5] The intransitive sense, to receive Communion, is recorded from 1550, and the OED now finds it chiefly in the United States.[5] From 1671, in Milton's Paradise Regained, it came to mean communicating intimately, at a deep spiritual level, as in to commune with nature;[5][15][12] the older sense of plain conversation is now rare or archaic.[5] The noun commune, the act of communing, is recorded from 1814 in Southey,[5] although Merriam-Webster dates it to the 15th century.[15] In Scots law, communings are the negotiations before a contract is drawn up.[12]

Timeline

  • c. 1303 – comonen, to have dealings with others.[3]
  • 1340 – to share something, to take part.[2]
  • before 1393 – to talk together, converse.[5][3]
  • before 1400 – to give Communion to someone (obsolete by 1500).[5]
  • 1550 – to receive Communion.[5]
  • 1671 – to communicate intimately, at a deep spiritual level.[5]
  • 1814 – noun, the act of communing; communion.[5]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To feel closely in touch with something, especially at a spiritual level, followed by with: He walked into the hills to commune with nature.[15][12][5]
  2. To talk together intimately; to converse or exchange thoughts.[12][15][5]
  3. (chiefly US) To receive Holy Communion.[11][5]

Noun

  1. Intimate conversation or communion: in commune with the hills.[12][15][6]

Word family

  • communer

commune2 community, administrative district

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1673
Borrowed from
French commune
Ultimate origin
Latin commūnis

Pronunciation

  • /ˈkɒmjuːn/, /ˈkɑmjuːn/[1]

Etymology

The noun is borrowed from French commune (“free city, community; local administrative district”),[4][3][5][7] an alteration of Middle French comugne,[11] from Medieval Latin commūnia (“community, that which is common”),[4][10][6] originally the neuter plural of Latin commūnis (“common”), taken as a feminine singular.[6][16][7] Merriam-Webster gives the Medieval Latin forms as commūna and commūnia.[15][9] The American Heritage Dictionary relates commūnis to Proto-Indo-European *mei-,[10] and Etymonline to a compound Proto-Indo-European *ko-moin-i- (“held in common”).[4] In Old French the word is recorded from the 12th century;[4][5] the English noun common was also spelled commune or commun in early use.[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Merriam-Webster dates the noun to 1673,[11][15] and the Shorter Oxford and the Oxford Dictionary of English to the late 17th century.[6][17] The OED's first record, for a small administrative district of France, is in Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790),[5] and Etymonline and Barnhart date it to 1792, in a French context.[4][3]

Semantic evolution

The modern French sense, the smallest administrative division governed by a mayor and council, was established by the National Assembly in 1789,[5] and English took it over in writing about France.[5][4] In 1792 the word was used of the revolutionary committee that governed Paris until 1794, and in 1871 of the short-lived socialist government of Paris, the Paris Commune.[5][4] It was extended to similar divisions in other countries, such as the Russian mir (1841),[5] and to communal settlements in communist countries (1919).[5][3] Historians used it from 1837 for a medieval municipal corporation.[5] The sense "a group of people living together and sharing property, work and income", first recorded in 1875, seems to have developed within English;[5] Etymonline links it with the idealistic communities of the 1840s in the United States and with the hippie settlements of the late 1960s.[4]

Timeline

  • 1673 – the smallest administrative district of a country.[11][15] The OED's first record of this sense, for France, is from 1790.[5]
  • 1792 – the revolutionary committee that governed Paris.[5][4]
  • 1837 – in medieval history, a municipal corporation.[5]
  • 1841 – a similar administrative division in other countries.[5]
  • 1871 – the socialist government of Paris in 1871.[5][4]
  • 1875 – a group practising communal living.[5]
  • 1919 – a communal settlement in a communist country.[5][3]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A group of people who live together and share property, work and income: they left the city to join a commune.[5][15][1]
  2. The smallest administrative district of France and many other countries, governed by a mayor and council.[11][15][5]
  3. A communal settlement or farm in a communist country.[5][3]
  4. In medieval history, a self-governing town or municipal corporation.[5][11]
  5. The common people; the commonalty.[11][15]

Word family

  • people's commune

References

  1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b c d e Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  7. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  8. ^ a b Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
  9. ^ a b Gove, Philip Babcock, ed. (1961), Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam
  10. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  11. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  12. ^ a b c d e f Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  13. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  14. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
  15. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  16. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  17. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Commune.” Etymologically, 31 Oct. 2026, etymologically.com/en/commune. Accessed 1 Nov. 2026.

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